Science delivered highs and lows last week, with Science Week Ireland informing and entertaining thousands of young people across the country even as controversy over a PhD saw the Government's chief science adviser stepping down from his post.
Both events have the potential to deliver a lasting impact, but for very different reasons. One can only hope that the more than 350 events held during our annual national science festival will have inspired primary and secondary school students to take a fresh look at the sciences.
Pupil interest in science, maths and engineering has been in decline for some years as students turn their faces away from these undoubtedly difficult subjects in favour of arts and business. Such student choices are made freely but carry with them a threat to our future economic wellbeing. The Government wisely has sought to recast wealth-creation here by steering us towards a knowledge-based economy. New knowledge only comes from research, however, and we will find ourselves in a difficult place without the scientists, engineers and mathematicians to create this knowledge resource.
Students have long lamented the "boring" aspects of the sciences, the lack of experimental work, the static and uninteresting texts and the turgid curriculum. This has changed in recent years however with fresh new science curriculums at both primary and second level. A great deal more hands-on experimental work has been incorporated into these programmes, making the science both more real and also more exciting. This in itself is not enough, however, and here is where Science Week and other science outreach programmes must play their part. Children have a natural curiosity for the world about them. The fun science events held during the week are designed to tap into this and direct it towards the sciences. Who can say how many pupils who watched a chemistry experiment go pop or took part in a natural history workshop might, as a result, find themselves inclined to study science when they reach third level?
Watching the unseating of science adviser Barry McSweeney was a far less edifying sight. Without a doubt, the former head of the EU's Joint Research Centre is extremely capable and would have made a significant contribution in this post. But Mr McSweeney's talents will still be available to the State in a lower-profile advisory post in the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources. While the Opposition was correct to demand answers in relation to McSweeney's doctorate, the row descended perilously close to raw party politics at its denouement.